Of Withered Apples by Philip K. Dick Episode #91

Philip K. Dick | August 25, 2023

Of Withered Apples by Philip K. Dick Episode #91
Philip K. Dick

OF WITHERED APPLES

Episode #91 · Written by Philip K. Dick · Narrated by Scott Miller

A young woman feels an irresistible pull toward a ruined, lifeless orchard—drawn back again and again by something she can’t explain. What she thinks is only a strange obsession slowly reveals a far darker bond between the living and the dead.

The tapping at the window is only a dead leaf—but Lori knows better. Something in the wind is calling her back to the ruined orchard in the hills, where a single apple tree still clings to life among rows of rotting, lifeless trunks. Her husband doesn’t understand, her father-in-law doesn’t care, and even Lori can’t explain why she feels summoned there year after year. But the bond between her and the tree is no illusion—something waits for her in the cold mists, something hungry, something patient.

“Of Withered Apples” is a slow, creeping descent into a kind of horror that doesn’t announce itself with violence, but with familiarity—almost comfort—until it’s too late to recognize the danger. Dick uses ordinary elements: autumn leaves, a decaying farm, a quiet rural home, and turns them into a haunting story about connection, possession, and the price of ignoring your instincts. The orchard is dead. The tree is alive. And the question becomes: why?

This story stands out in Philip K. Dick’s early work because of its subtle, atmospheric dread rather than his usual explorations of altered consciousness or authoritarian worlds. It shows a different side of the author—a side comfortable with folklore-like unease, uncanny nature, and the chilling thought that something ancient may still be listening when the wind shifts.

ABOUT THE AUTHOR

Philip K. Dick wrote more than 120 short stories and 44 novels, becoming one of the most studied science fiction writers in history. His stories inspired major films and series including Blade Runner, A Scanner Darkly, Total Recall, The Adjustment Bureau, and The Man in the High Castle. But before Hollywood adapted his visions of androids and broken futures, Dick published short tales in small magazines—sharp, eerie, imaginative pieces like this one that prove his genius didn’t depend on technology or space travel. Even in a forgotten orchard, he could show how fragile our world really is.

“Of Withered Apples” reminds us that not every haunting comes from the supernatural—sometimes it comes from something that still remembers us, even when we try to walk away.

LISTEN TO THE STORY

Listen to Of Withered Apples by Philip K. Dick — a vintage science fiction tale of eerie obsession and unseen forces rooted in an abandoned orchard. A haunting classic sci-fi story.

PHILIP K. DICK SHORT STORIES

No writer has shaped The Lost Sci-Fi Podcast more profoundly than Philip K. Dick.

From the very beginning, Dick’s uneasy visions have pulsed at the heart of this show. Episode 1 featured The Hanging Stranger, a chilling tale of a corpse swaying in a public square while ordinary citizens hurry past as if nothing is wrong. That opening story set the tone for everything that followed — paranoia in broad daylight, reality bending at the edges, and the quiet suspicion that the world you trust has already been replaced.

Dick’s genius was not in rockets or distant galaxies alone. He brought the strange into living rooms, offices, schoolyards, and suburban streets. In The Father Thing, a young boy becomes convinced his father has been replaced by something wearing his face. Human Is asks whether a man who returns from space truly is the same person — or whether “better” might mean something far more unsettling. Adjustment Team reveals unseen bureaucrats pausing and resetting reality itself while one man accidentally slips between the cracks.

Some stories strike with dark humor. The Eyes Have It turns casual figures of speech into proof of alien invasion. Sales Pitch unleashes a relentless robotic salesman that refuses to take no for an answer. Others cut deeper. Foster, You’re Dead! exposes the fear-driven consumerism of the Cold War era. Breakfast at Twilight drops an unsuspecting family into the aftermath of atomic catastrophe.

Across more than thirty narrated stories, we’ve traveled through Dick’s shifting realities: the eerie colonization of Mars in Tony and the Beetles, the strange evolutionary leap in The Golden Man, the quiet dread of Beyond the Door, the aching nostalgia of Exhibit Piece, and the philosophical unease of The Turning Wheel. Whether he’s writing about android prejudice in James P. Crow, divine intrusion in Upon the Dull Earth, or time paradoxes in The Skull, Dick always returns to one question: what does it mean to be real?

No other author appears more often in our catalog. No other writer has unsettled us so consistently. Explore the stories below and step into the shifting, unstable, unforgettable worlds of Philip K. Dick — the writer who launched this podcast and continues to haunt it.

ABOUT THE LOST SCI-FI PODCAST

The Lost Sci-Fi Podcast is the most listened-to vintage science fiction podcast in the world. Ranked the #1 Science Fiction Podcast in 34 countries and heard in more than 190 countries, the show has surpassed 3.8 million listens.

Each episode features carefully selected stories from the Golden Age of science fiction, professionally narrated. Timeless storytelling the way it was meant to be heard.

What listeners are saying:

★★★★★ “I don’t remember how exactly I found this podcast, but I fell in love with it right away, probably after the first two paragraphs of the narrated story I listened to first. I have a rather big list of podcasts I’m subscribed to, but whenever I see an update from the Lost Sci-Fi, it immediately gets to the first position in my listening queue. Great selection of SciFi works, unparalleled narration where everything only adds up to creating a very enjoyable listening experience: the narrator’s deep and clear voice, just the right speed of the narration, and a perfect balance between narrating and voice acting.”
— ThatsMeMomLetMeIn

★★★★★ “Fabulous podcast. Really enjoy listening from the UK.”
— JackFordMacYouTube

Vintage science fiction. Professionally narrated. Carefully curated.